Kelly and I sprang awake at some ungodly hour (6 or 7 AM), and with a hankerin’ for breakfast, we headed down to “Perry’s Smorgy Restaurant”. A breakfast buffet for $5.95! Oh yeah. Fresh papaya and pineapple and kona coffee. Very nice.

Afterwards, we farted around for a little bit and then decided to go to the Waikiki Aquarium. It’s only about a 15 minute walk from our hotel down towards Diamond Head. It’s kind of a small affair — but well worth the $7 fee. Quite a few large tanks, and some really neat tanks with cuttlefish (ne’ squids), octopi, chambered Nautiluses, frog fish, etc. Shortly after arriving, I realized that the batteries in the cam were exhausted, so alas! no photos. Check out the website… Anyway… we wanted to go outside and see the monk seals and other exhibits outside, but it was raining hard enough for even the most accustomed of Hawaiian to consider staying inside. (It is worth noting that rain comes and goes as it pleases, and does not stay around long. Much like Kentucky’s weather patterns, far quicker in cycle.) Kelly and I took seats in the auditorium-style seats in front of the main tank.

After a couple of minutes of idle watching, Kelly begins to assign not only names to the fish we have been watching, but also personality traits and backstories. The two blacktip reef sharks were Arliss and Mason, well-tempered but somewhat silent cousins of the Zebra shark — B. B. B. B. is slightly retarded, and is both tolerated and protected by Arliss and Mason. B. B. appeared to Kelly to be retarded on account of his lazy, yet tight circles he (she?) would swim, and the silly expression on his face. Me, personally, I think he just appeared lazy because of his elongated body structure, but WHO KNOWS. I’ll operate under the assumption that there can be retarded sharks. There were also Ed and Ted (short for Edward and Tedward) — I think they might have been Tuna, but who knows. Oh, yes, they are twins. Kelly says they are known to often finish each others sentences, and dinners (they already dress alike). B. B. required protection because of Stuart, a species of long and angry-looking fish. Little is known about this one. Other players included Snaggles the buck-toothed red snapper, and Carl the Bluefin Jack with a hard past (Kelly says he spoke like Tony, the mob boss on the Simpsons).

We finally decided to brave the rain, so we headed outside to check out the Monk Seals, coral, etc. The Monk seals were awesome! They looked like giant, underwater cat people. One of them (they were also by named by Kelly), Conrad, often would stand upside-down in the tank, and stay there for minutes at a time. He would then float in front of us, standing upright like a human, and spin himself around with one fin. It was cute as all hell! I would trade him for Mr. Cheese any day. Well, maybe some sort of timeshare. Mandy was the other seal, and Kelly likened her to some sort of young, seal trophy wife. If a seal could fit in our tub, we’d have one by now.

After the aquarium, we hit the beach for a while to wait for Chuck and Danna who arrived about an hour and a half late due to massive headwinds. We met up with them at our hotel, and we walked down Kuhio Avenue and just fooled about, really. It started raining a little bit — and Danna managed to get lei’d by a young 14 year old girl. This girl came up and slapped these leis around us all, and then demanded money. Ah well, thank you no, save for one. Danna utilized it to make their room/closet smell a little better. Hopefully Chuck and Danna can post photos of their “closet”. It’s roomy, for a closet.

After a walk on the beach, we headed through the lobby of the Sheraton, dripping wet, through a gaggle of black-tie affair attendees. Oooh boy, too funny. But that is the dichotomy of Hawaii, I think. Any place where it rains all the time in short bursts and there is a good possibility of sweating, everyone has an understanding.

Anywho, we split up as Kelly and I needed a bite to eat, and Chuck and Danna were no doubt jet-lagged. In the morning — Aloha Stadium and Pearl Harbor and the Arizona Memorial.